


Confession

by radiantdean



Category: SPN, Supernatural
Genre: Emmanuel!Cas, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 10:18:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6980095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/radiantdean/pseuds/radiantdean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean has a long talk with Emmanuel on their way to help Sam.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Confession

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you're interested, my tumblr is radiantdean :)

“And you’re sure there’s nothing I can help you with?”

Dean tore his eyes away from the road for a moment and looked over to the passenger seat, meeting the concerned blue eyes of his newest companion. He had seen that expression too many times before — eyebrows dropped low over searching eyes, lips parted slightly and slanted downward at the corners, mountains and valleys formed by crinkled skin across the forehead.

“I’m fine, Emmanuel,” Dean said, the name more than strange on his tongue. “It’s my brother that needs help.”

“I know, you said. But I believe that you need help, too.”

Dean shook his head, curling his fingers more tightly around the steering wheel as he watched black asphalt disappear beneath the car. “There’s nothing I need help with. We’re doing this for Sam.”

“Just as long as you understand that my purpose is to help people,” Emmanuel said. “And I would be happy to help you, as soon as you come to your senses.”

“For the last time, I’m fine,” Dean said. Though he didn’t raise his voice, his tone became more aggressive, more authoritative. It was a tone that usually shut Sam up in a heartbeat, but Dean forgot he wasn’t dealing with his little brother.

“Then why do I feel so much anger from you?” Emmanuel said. “So much sadness. There is so much… darkness. What happened to you, Dean?”

Dean almost had to stifle a laugh, his foot pressing down ever-so-slightly on the accelerator. What had happened to him? What hadn’t happened to him was a better question. But, just as suddenly as he’d felt the urge to laugh, to laugh over what a shit-show his life was, to laugh in the face of pain, to laugh and bury everything six feet under, that urge disappeared and was replaced by the inexplicable compulsion to speak, to actually tell his story.

It remained silent for another moment as Dean rolled his lips together, keeping his mouth closed tightly in an effort to physically keep the words from spilling forth. But he could feel Emmanuel’s eyes on him, studying, observing, understanding, and Dean just couldn’t resist any longer.

“I lost someone,” he said finally, refusing to take his eyes off the road. /That’s it/, he promised himself. /That’s all I’m gonna say/.

“Who did you lose?” Emmanuel asked softly.

“This guy,” Dean was saying, before he could stop himself. “This guy, uh. Castiel. Nerdy little guy. Always wearing a trench coat, could never do his tie. It was always, uh, backwards, you know?” He gestured to his chest as if he were wearing a tie, the smallest and fondest of smiles tugging at his lips. “I usually had to fix it.”

“How did you know him?”

“He rescued me,” Dean said simply, almost casually. /Isn’t that an understatement/, he thought to himself. “He rescued me and brought me back to my brother. I was really going through some tough shit, and… and this little guy sticks his neck out and saves my fucked-up ass from hell. What kind of guy does that, you know?”

Emmanuel didn’t say anything, but Dean saw him nod just out of the corner of his eye.

“He was so quiet,” Dean continued, unable to stop himself now that he’d opened the flood gates. “Really didn’t have much to say. But he was there, no matter what me and my brother were going through. And we went through… God, you wouldn’t believe it. He was there every step of the way. Sorta mysterious, sure, but it was just… it was just comforting to have him around. He didn’t have to say anything.”

“No?” Emmanuel prompted softly.

Dean shook his head, his hands moving over the curve of the steering wheel, his left knee bouncing gently, knocking against the door. “Sometimes just the reminder that someone’s there is enough, you know? And he was always there. And some nights I’d be feeling low. Real, real low. Like, as low as I felt when this guy busted my ass outta the flames. But just like that, he’d be there all over again, like that first time.”

“And he’d help you?”

“Yeah,” Dean said, taking a moment to swallow and lick his lips. “He’d have this real stony way about him, like everything he said was fact. Most people didn’t… they didn’t get it. They were weirded out by it, but it… it made me feel warm.”

“Warm?”

“I can’t think of any other way to describe it,” Dean said. Somewhere in the back of his head he was grateful that the road in front of him was straight because he couldn’t focus on it anymore. “I really can’t. Looking back on it now, I guess that’s how it feels to fall in love. Just kinda… warm. I didn’t know at the time, I’d never been in love before. But Cas was… so different. And one night I just… it all came to a head.”

“What happened?”

“I was pretty drunk, and I’d somehow convinced this uptight, straight-laced guy to do the same, not let me drink alone and all, you know. There was obviously this, uh, attraction between us — he was a good looking guy. Crazy gorgeous eyes.” Dean paused and glanced over, meeting Emmanuel’s gaze. “Looked a little bit like you, I guess.” He watched the man sitting beside him for a moment, searching for any flicker of recognition, before returning his attention to the road and taking a deep breath. “We had sex,” he said on the exhale, the words almost blissful. “It was my first time with a guy and it was… it was awesome.”

This time, Dean really couldn’t resist that small smile that enveloped his expression. Maybe his memory was tainted, as memories often are, but regardless, he knew that nothing could take away the way he remembered that night.

“I won’t go into the details,” he said after a moment, pulling himself back to the present. “But from then on, it became kind of a thing. I’d sleep with Cas every once in a while, whenever I felt up for it. I couldn’t always get to that place, though. Sometimes I’d go and pick up a girl at a bar. It was never the same, so the next night, I’d call Cas. Whatever happened between us, I’d always… I’d always run out of the room the next morning. As if Cas was some sleazy hookup, or something, as if he was some girl whose name I didn’t even know.”

“But he wasn’t,” Emmanuel said. It wasn’t a question, and Dean felt his chest tighten.

“No, he wasn’t,” he said. “But I couldn’t admit it to myself. I don’t know if I didn’t get the bisexual thing, or if it was the fact that I suddenly had feelings for one of my best friends. Looking back on it, I think it was both. Especially… especially figuring out that I wasn’t straight. Cause, you know, I was raised a Kansas boy. Sleeping with a dude isn’t exactly ‘okay’.” /But I did it anyway/, Dean added to himself.

“So what happened?” Emmanuel prompted quietly when Dean had been silent for some time.

Dean sighed, his tongue snaking out to wet his lips. “Cas died, almost a year ago,” he said. “And I can’t… I can’t get him out of my head.”

“Do you want him out of your head?”

“No, of course not,” Dean said. “I just mean… I’ve been having these nightmares lately. I’m back in one of those motels, waking up next to Cas. And just like it always happened, I’ll lunge out of bed and scramble to get my clothes on so I can get back in my car and drive away as fast as possible. But in the doorway, one foot outside of the room, I stop and, and I don’t know how, but right then I know it’s a dream. And man, you know what I do? I turn around and get right back in bed. I pull Cas in like I never did before, and I just kinda hold him there. I— I try to say something, but the second I open my mouth, I wake up. And it’s gone. He’s gone.”

“If you wish,” Emmanuel said slowly. “I can take those nightmares from you.”

Dean shook his head before Emmanuel was finished speaking. “No,” he said. “No, I want them. It’s just— I never got to turn around, you know? In real life, I never got to turn around. And I never got to say anything.”

“What would you say?” Emmanuel asked.

“What would I say?” Dean asked, glancing over at him.

“If you got the chance. What would you say?”

Dean swallowed, his brow creasing slightly. “I think the first thing I’d tell him is I’m sorry. For always leaving first, usually before he even woke up. Then— then I think I’d say thank you — cause he sure as hell never heard that enough. If ever. Cause it all meant something, you know? I think I’d tell him that, too, that it all meant something. The sex, the late night talks, everything. It all meant something.”

“What did it mean?”

“It meant that I was—“ Dean cut off, his mouth practically snapping shut.

/I was head over heels/.

/I was nothing without him/.

/I was surviving because of him/. 

/I was saved because of him/. 

/I was devastated when I lost him/.

/I was laughing with him like I’ve never laughed before/.

/I was hopeful because of him/.

/I was faithful/.

/I was in love with him/.

“I was in love with him,” Dean said quietly. The words seemed to hang in the air once they were spoken, filling the car and blurring Dean’s vision, blocking his throat, wrapping around his chest and squeezing until he couldn’t breath. /I was in love with him/. 

They sat in silence for a moment. It took everything Dean had to focus on his breathing, to steady his heartbeat, with those words still bouncing around in his head.

“You were?” Emmanuel finally said.

“Am,” Dean immediately amended. “I am in love with him.”

They were quiet again, the only sound that of Emmanuel’s rustling clothes as he repositioned himself to face completely forward, his hands folding neatly in his lap. Dean didn’t dare look over. He couldn’t look at that face.

“I could help,” Emmanuel said. “I could take it all away. You wouldn’t feel any more pain.”

“No,” Dean said, his knuckles bleeding white as he gripped the steering wheel. “No. I’d feel all the pain in the world for Cas. He’s done it for me.”

Emmanuel looked over at Dean, observing the forced set of his jaw, the hard gaze, the tensed muscles. “I don’t know if I’ve ever met a man more in love,” he said softly.


End file.
